Cycling is about "Safe exercise" and "Safe low-emission travel" The Health and Fitness objective is UNDERMINED if the means of exercise is UNSAFE! This blog STRONGLY OPPOSES certain reforms VicRoads is currently considering: “cyclists could be allowed to treat red lights as Give Way signs. And the same could also APPLY at pedestrian lights."
Also "PERMITTING cyclists, riding cautiously, to proceed past a stationary tram;" "allowing teenagers to ride on footpaths"(Herald Sun)PDowe

Saturday, October 4, 2014

Community Safety Violence by Men against Women Three Women attacked in Brunswick May 2014 The Age May 15th & 17th 2014 CCTV Moreland Council fails to deliver on CCTV promise 2 Years after Jill Meagher’s murder Herald Sun 16.9.14 Pedestrian Safety

Will Richmond be AFL Premiers before Moreland City Council installs CCTV?

Moreland City Council has still not provided the community
safety initiatives of public lighting and CCTV

Moreland Council encourages vigilantism and demonising
law-abiding-men for walking,

because of it's ineptitude and failure to serve its
community.

Why don't you shut up and just do your job instead Moreland
City Council!

A year and a half after the night Ms Meagher was abducted in Brunswick, police are hunting another sexual predator who pulled two young women into side streets from Sydney Road in separate incidents last weekend while they were heading home from Brunswick bars.

The women, both aged 22, managed to escape the attacker, who grabbed them from behind, dragged them into dark streets and indecently assaulted them.

A year and a half after the night Ms Meagher was abducted in Brunswick, police are hunting another sexual predator who pulled two young women into side streets from Sydney Road in separate incidents last weekend while they were heading home from Brunswick bars.

The women, both aged 22, managed to escape the attacker, who grabbed them from behind, dragged them into dark streets and indecently assaulted them.

"Sydney Road is a very cosmopolitan area, there are a lot of restaurants and night clubs and licensed venues ... People should be free to come and go and visit and do what they want to do."

One of the victims ran to her cousins's house in Brunswick after she was attacked.

Police want to speak to this man. Photo: Supplied

The cousin, who did not want to be named, told Fairfax Media the victim had been in the "wrong place at their wrong time", and it could have happened to anybody.

"She is just very lucky ... she didn't fight him away, she was yelling and he was grabbing her face and she felt totally overpowered by his strength, but all of a sudden he just took off," she said.

"I think its crazy for people to walk home alone ... there should not be any false sense of security.

"If the wrong person is around, that's all it takes."

Senior Constable Solomon said the man had approached the women from behind and, in both instances, grabbed them in a "bear hug" or "head-lock" before dragging them down side streets.

"With one of them, he has tried to sit on top of her and pin her arms as she was throwing her arms around trying to get away," he said.

"In the end I think he has just given up and gone."

In the first incident, a young woman was indecently assaulted in Stuart Street about 1.15am. The woman managed to escape and she ran back to Sydney Road, flagging down a friend who was passing by in a cab.

Police said the man approached the other woman on nearby Charles Street the same night. He wrestled her to the ground, but the 22-year-old pulled herself free and ran home.

Neither woman was physically injured in the attacks.

Senior Constable Solomon said the man told one of the victims it was the first time he had ever tried to attack a woman, according to police.

"To one of the victims he said he was homeless and this is the first time he had ever done this sort of thing," Senior Constable Solomon said.

He said the indecent assaults should be a warning for all people - not just women - to be careful when leaving night-spots by themselves.

"I wouldn't just say women, I'd say all members of the community ... you need to be vigilant of the areas you are in.

"I wouldn't want to be a male walking home that time of night either.

He said police were working hard to find and arrest the offender to "restore the community's faith".

Investigators have released a photo of a man they would like to speak to about the incidents.

He is described as 180 centimetres tall with a thin build and fair complexion. At the time, he was wearing a dark-coloured hoodie with blue jeans.

Anyone with information is asked to phone Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.

Moreland Council fails to deliver on CCTV promise after Jill Meagher’s murder

MICHELLE AINSWORTH

HERALD SUN

SEPTEMBER 16, 201411:41PM

Jill Meagher.

ALMOST two years after Jill Meagher was killed while walking home alone from a Brunswick bar, the local council still hasn’t installed CCTV CAMERAS on the street where she was last seen alive.

Despite accepting $250,000 from the State Government and agreeing in June last year to install nine cameras along Sydney Rd, Moreland Council has failed to get any of those cameras working.

And new figures show that last year, 60 parolees were convicted of a violent or sexual offence committed after they were given early release. On average, they reoffended within six months of release.

In a sign that there are still serious problems with the state’s parole system one in four of the offences — which included seven sex offences — was committed in the year to June.

The figures from the Adult Parole Board annual report, tabled in Parliament yesterday, show 60 parolees were convicted of 75 offences, including 24 aggravated burglaries; 17 threats to kill; 11 of causing SERIOUS INJURY; 11 armed robberies; three kidnappings; and one manslaughter.

Corrections Minister Edward O’Donohue said there were “good signs”.

Thousands of people attend the Jill Meagher peace march along Sydney Road.

“Under the Coalition Government’s reforms, fewer offenders were GRANTED parole and almost double the number of offenders were denied parole,” Mr O’Donohue said.

But he slammed Moreland Council for its failure to install the nine cameras.

“It is just extraordinary that Moreland Council has utterly failed in delivering this CCTV SYSTEM in the interests of community safety, when they have been given the money to buy the cameras, and Victoria Police has advised it.”

The Herald Sun can reveal Moreland Council has installed four of the nine CCTV CAMERAS along Sydney Rd, Brunswick, but none is operational despite the installation of signs advising that CCTV is operating in the area.

Moreland Mayor Lambros Tapinos said the camera rollout was much more complex than simply putting a camera on a pole.

“The rollout of the cameras has been frustratingly slow, because of many layers of permissions required from the POWER COMPANIES and from other owners of the light poles in the municipality,” Mr Tapinos said.

“Four of the nine cameras are installed and another four will be installed this week.

“We are looking forward to the system being operational as soon as possible,” he said.

It is understood council had to seek permission from POWER COMPANY AGL and government body VicTrack to attach the cameras to their poles.

The council was offered $250,000 by the Government in February 2013 to buy cameras for Sydney Rd, where Ms Meagher was last seen before being killed in September 2012.